Because theists ask for evidence against gods, when clearly there is none. And on and on it goes, because it's impossible to prove or disprove that something that doesn't exist either exists or doesn't. Therefore, that it doesn't exist seems the obvious conclusion, or does it?

I once told religious kids that I'm an atheist. They looked at me with bewilderment and said, "You're really stupid. It's pretty obvious that there is a God."

On the other hand, there is the idea of divine hiddenness.

I'm wondering how it can be simultaneously obvious that God exists, and that God is hidden.

The problem of evidence is a problem already acknowledged by the God-Existence debate. It's nothing new.

French Philosopher Blaise Pascal argued that evidence for God is clear to the people who are willing to believe, not because it is mutually exclusive, but because your perspective is changed when you are absorbed into tradition and belief. Whereas the evidence is also vague enough for the people who do not believe, will not understand.

Now what that argues is that — there is more to comprehensive reality than what meets the eye.

I will give what I think is compelling evidence for a divine consciousness.

(1) Human beings and other animals are conscious and self-aware.
(2) Human beings and other conscious animals are made of matter.
(3) Matter collected and organized itself somehow in order to become conscious.
(4) Either matter collected and organized itself into conscious beings purely by accident or by design.
(5) It seems highly unlikely to me that inanimate matter could spontaneously collect and organize itself into conscious beings all on its own without some kind of guidance.
(6) Thus, it is highly likely that matter was guided by some conscious being to form into conscious animals.

(7) I call this guiding consciousness "God".

Perhaps you find this arguement compelling. Perhaps you don't. I do. That said, I don't deign to suggest I know what God's nature is. For me, it is a matter of faith that God's nature is loving. I have my reasons for believing this. One reason is that conscious beings such as ourselves appear to be able to have empathy, compassion, and love for one another. If God created us to be conscious like Him/Herself, then I think God also has empathy, compassion, and love for us.

Therein lies the lie. That is NOT how the concept of “god” is generally used.

If your definition of “god” is accepted everyone knows there is a “god”. God refers to “deity” in the argumentation of for or against the proposition. If there is a deity then it is up to the claim to explicate what this deity is ... yet it cannot. It is concept, in this sense, dealing with the limitations of human comprehension dressed up as some anthropomorphic “being”. Once the concept of ‘god’ is used outside of the ‘deity’ idea it is more of an intellectual item to toy with. I feel this is why religions have managed to last; they entice the human intellect to the idea of “beyond” and encourage us to grasp for something else we’re admittedly ignorant of.

Because theists ask for evidence against gods, when clearly there is none. And on and on it goes, because it's impossible to prove or disprove that something that doesn't exist either exists or doesn't. — whollyrolling

All you have to do to disprove God is show the universe is not a creation.



There is a long history of theist justification for the existence of God, part of which is discussed here:

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/5577/was-there-a-first-cause-reviewing-the-five-ways/p1

In short there is a lot of evidence for a first cause and no evidence against. There is no evidence to suggest the first cause is the God of any of the conventional religions though nor is there evidence to support the characteristics of God assigned by conventional religion (3Os etc...).

There is no evidence to suggest the first cause is the God of any of the conventional religions though nor is there evidence to support the characteristics of God assigned by conventional religion — Devans99

Likewise, there is also no evidence to prove otherwise?

Likewise, there is also no evidence to prove otherwise? — SethRy

I think an argument contrary to conventional religion can be made for 3 out of 4 Os:

Omnipotence - Could God create a copy of himself? If he did create a copy of himself, he would no longer be omni-potent, so we can conclude God is effectively not omni-potent.

Omniscience - To know everything about one’s self requires memory storage larger than one’s self so it is not possible to even know everything even about one’s self. For example, say a particle has 4 attributes (mass, charge, position, momentum) then (at least) 4 analog bits (=4 particles) are required to encode that knowledge.

Omnibenevolent - This requires infallibility which in turn requires perfect information (omniscience) before making decisions.

Omnipresence - I can't think of a logical rebuttal for this one.

Therein lies the lie. That is NOT how the concept of “god” is generally used.

If your definition of “god” is accepted everyone knows there is a “god”. God refers to “deity” in the argumentation of for or against the proposition. If there is a deity then it is up to the claim to explicate what this deity is ... yet it cannot. It is concept, in this sense, dealing with the limitations of human comprehension dressed up as some anthropomorphic “being”. Once the concept of ‘god’ is used outside of the ‘deity’ idea it is more of an intellectual item to toy with. I feel this is why religions have managed to last; they entice the human intellect to the idea of “beyond” and encourage us to grasp for something else we’re admittedly ignorant of. — I like sushi

I think a great many if not most religious people actually feel the same way I do. They just practice their religions to be closer to the divine without actually literally believing all of the teachings or words of any given "sacred" text. Many if not most practicing Christians, for example, are probably agnostic on many of the Bible's stories, and very few practicing Christians take the Bible to be the inviolable "Word of God" in the sense that it isn't open to various interpretatoins with layers of meaning.

When a Christian or a person of another theistic religion says that their God exists, the truth is that they are saying this because they believe that God(s) exists. Regardless of how sure they claim to be or what "evidence" they give, the fact is that is simply what they believe, because no one knows if any God(s) exist, which is the exact reason why no evidence has been provided for the existence of any God(s). — Maureen

Assuming you're asking this in good faith, I can think of several effective responses f(rom the perspective of philosophy of religion rather than Christian apologetics.)

First, the scope of phenomena for which there can be evidence is very specific, in some ways. The scope of subjects for which empirical evidence can be adduced in principle, is pretty much the same as the scope of the empirical sciences generally. In other words, scientific method generally proceeds in terms of what is believed to be testable in terms of empirical evidence. If you make a scientific claim, then it would be generally expected that it could be supported by observational or experimental evidence.

But there are also many types of claims - even some basic to science itself - which are not empirical in that sense. Such claims as, what is the nature of number? Is number something invented by the mind, or are they real independently of any act of thought? Now, I don't want to divert the thread into that question, I'm only raising it as an example. And actually, it's an example of an ontological or metaphysical question, which I don't think is directly solvable in terms of evidence; it's a question of judgement.

I think another such question is the matter of what are called 'the laws of science'. Are they something that exists independently of any act of observation by a scientist, waiting to be discovered? You might argue either for or against, but I don't see how you could adduce any empirical evidence for one side or the other.

There are other lines of argument possible, but I will leave it at that for now.

I think another such question is the matter of what are called 'the laws of science'. Are they something that exists independently of any act of observation by a scientist, waiting to be discovered? You might argue either for or against, but I don't see how you could adduce any empirical evidence for one side or the other. — Wayfarer

The Big Bang looks like empirical evidence for an unnatural first cause:

- Natural events come in pluralities. The BB was a singleton
- Entropy was unnaturally low at the BB
- Space itself is expanding in an unnatural manner
- The BB needs a cause, must be something not of spacetime (unnatural)

This could be interpreted as evidence in favour of an unnatural first cause; which could be regarded as bolstering the theist position and undermining the atheist position.

There is also plenty of evidence for a start of time which could be likewise used to support the theist position.

There is no evidence that can be used to support the atheist viewpoint that I'm aware of, excepting that there is logical evidence against the claims for specific attributes of the first cause (like the 3Os) which I gave above.

In the light of the OP the question is posed between “theism” and “atheism” where the former is framed, generally speaking, as a belief in a ‘deity’ as creator of humans and the universe.

You’re probably right about most people calling themselves “religious” as having the same and/or similar views to you. The issue comes down to the definitions commonly used/misused. I have no problem with regarding a “religious attitude” (so to speak) with being wholly divorced from belief in a ‘deity’. When it comes to theism and atheism I’d say the argument is different - where the atheist calls for evidence of a ‘deity’ not merely for evidence of human belief in reality and how we appropriate ourselves within/about said reality.

The trick of many theists, and of many atheists, is to blur these lines of distinction in order to undermine the others position. An all pervading universal force/law is nothing more to the rational mind than natural laws as opposed to “supernatural” - which, if you follow the logic through is another meaningless concept that appears to be sensible but is anything but sensible, as if we’re to know of something it is “natural” not “supernatural,” thus undermining the premise of “supernatural” and merely revealing it as, at best, a distorted version of human ignorance/skepticism. We’re in the habit of naming items of experience, or items outside of experience, in order to create a picture of understanding to stave off fear. Naming some ‘deity’ may give some people a sense of grounding they need whilst others, like yourself, are more about addressing the unknown with more humility rather than dogma.

Like Russell said, no one can disprove that a teapot is orbiting Jupiter, yet we don’t assume there is. The major difference being we do actually know what a teapot is and have experience of one. A ‘deity’ is just an empty concept, yet by being empty it is limitless - a scary thought that makes us attach physicality to it in order to hold off our relative insignificance in the face of an infinite universe.

Well said. I tend to think that many Christians, for example, are afraid of disapproval from their fundamentalist pastors, reverends, and priests; so they pay lip service to the tenets of their faith lest they be shamed and shunned by their community. Most of them are probably like me in their hearts.

An all pervading universal force/law is nothing more to the rational mind than natural laws as opposed to “supernatural” - which, if you follow the logic through is another meaningless concept that appears to be sensible but is anything but sensible, as if we’re to know of something it is “natural” not “supernatural,” thus undermining the premise of “supernatural” and merely revealing it as, at best, a distorted version of human ignorance/skepticism. — I like sushi

Nature is the contents of spacetime. Spacetime was created in the BB. By something not of spacetime. IE something supernatural. So we can't dismiss the supernatural.

Like Russell said, no one can disprove that a teapot is orbiting Jupiter, yet we don’t assume there is. — I like sushi

I think Russell's analogy is useless if a realistic definition of God is used (no 3Os) - for most people the following two propositions are equivalent:

1. The universe was created
2. There is a God

In no way can the first proposition be likened in silliness to a the teapot orbiting Jupiter; it is a perfectly reasonable proposition.

I don't think you understood what @I like sushi was saying at all.

What have I missed?

For one, you seem to be strengthening his argument, rather than refuting it. You have failed to define "God". That strengthens what he was saying with Russell's argument. Furthermore, his point about the natural vs. supernatural was completely missed by you, but I will let @I like sushi explain that one.

I did define God:

for most people the following two propositions are equivalent:

1. The universe was created
2. There is a God — Devans99

I addressed the point natural vs. supernatural by pointing there must logically be an supernatural first cause.

That's not defining "God". That's claiming there is a God.

As for the natural vs. supernatural, I don't think he would agree with your definition of "supernatural".

I defined God as the creator of the universe by saying those two propositions are equivalent.

That's like saying the Creator of the Universe is the Creator of the Universe. It doesn't tell us anything about "The Creator of the Universe". That's the crux of the teapot argument, I think.

The teapot argument is I think about the some of the ridiculous claims made about God in conventional religions. Once a realistic definition of God is used, the teapot argument is not valid.

I do not see a problem with defining God as the creator of the universe. Seems to me the only possible scientific definition of God. How would you define him?

Like I said, that's not a definition. That's like saying, "God is God," or "the Creator is the Creator." It says nothing about what it is. The teapot argument doesn't refute a First Cause, as it wasn't meant to refute that.

Also, I don't define Her/Him.

'God - NOUN

1(in Christianity and other monotheistic religions) the creator and ruler of the universe and source of all moral authority; the supreme being.'


https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/god

That says more than what you are saying, but each religion further defines "God" according to their traditions.

Omnipotence - Could God create a copy of himself? If he did create a copy of himself, he would no longer be omni-potent, so we can conclude God is effectively not omni-potent. — Devans99

Yes he can, but in a way he already did. He created Jesus, which emanates from himself as a piece of him with the holy-spirit dwelling inside him. God creates a portion of himself to represent his wholeness, emanating from him, he is the total balance of creation. Although it is not the primitive definition which what humans would normally hold unto.

Omniscience - To know everything about one’s self requires memory storage larger than one’s self so it is not possible to even know everything even about one’s self. — Devans99

The semantics in this is confusing me. I am sorry.

The best answer I can offer though, however, is that God predates knowledge and logic (we had this discussion before). The void non-existence of something cannot even exist, that nothingness is nothing. From there, God as an omniscient being would have to withdraw from learning - and from there, knowledge as an infinite is incomprehensible when what God's capacity to store knowledge is beyond natural capability.

Omnibenevolent - This requires infallibility which in turn requires perfect information (omniscience) before making decisions. — Devans99

Analyzing your points, I think it is clarified that one supports the other. I hope I have satisfied you.

That says more than what you are saying, but each religion further defines "God" according to their traditions. — Noah Te Stroete

I think it is a fair point to make that if the universe was not created by a transcendent being, then there is no transcendent being. For the origins are only natural phenomena, not dogmatic history.

So what's your point exactly? Devans99 was saying that the origins of the universe are definitionally unnatural or supernatural.

Yes he can, but in a way he already did. He created Jesus, which emanates from himself as a piece of him with the holy-spirit dwelling inside him. God creates a portion of himself to represent his wholeness, emanating from him, he is the total balance of creation. — SethRy

So Jesus is a 'portion' of God rather than the whole of God. So Jesus is not a faithful copy of God - the part is not equal to the whole. By creating Jesus, God has subdivided himself, rather than created a copy of himself.

The best answer I can offer though, however, is that God predates knowledge and logic (we had this discussion before). The void non-existence of something cannot even exist, that nothingness is nothing. From there, God as an omniscient being would have to withdraw from learning - and from there, knowledge as an infinite is incomprehensible when what God's capacity to store knowledge is beyond natural capability. — SethRy

The point I am making is that the description of reality is more verbose than reality. So it is impossible to completely know 'oneself' because the description of oneself does not fit into oneself - it is larger than oneself. If God was non-material in a very funky way then possibly this does not apply